GIRLS SOCCER: Braintree beats Milton in opener

Caroline Cross’s tiebreaking goal early in the second half Tuesday lifted the Wamps to a 2-1 home win over the Wildcats.

By Trevor WennersThe Patriot Ledger

BRAINTREE – A goal apiece from freshman forward Angelina Joyce and senior Caroline Cross, along with two assists from junior forward Allyson O’Rourke, paced the Braintree High girls soccer team to a 2-1 season-opening victory Tuesday against Bay State Conference rival Milton.“I thought it was a good start to our season,” said O’Rourke. “Definitely having a win under our belt is awesome and I think we all played as a team. Everyone stepped up. It was not just three standouts, it was everyone.”

Milton scored first when Sophie Cousineau netted a goal about halfway through the opening half, assisted by Chae Diani.

Joyce then found the back of the net at the end of the first half.

Cross added the decisive goal about five minutes into the second half, again orchestrated by O’Rourke.

“It’s about momentum,” Braintree coach Matt Freeman said of the importance of Joyce’s equalizer. “(If) you go into the half one down, it’s a different conversation at halftime. You’ve got to come out in sort of a different offensive structure.

“Being tied at halftime, having the momentum going into the second half, knowing that we had more players coming off of our bench, we were a little bit more fresh. That was huge. That goal was huge and it gave us that swing that we needed coming into the second half.”

O’Rourke said she liked her team’s resiliency after going down a goal early.

“I think that was awesome how we came back,” said O’Rourke. “When we sat down at halftime, we (figured) we just came from a goal (down), we can score another one. And we did, right off the bat.”

Senior goalkeeper Christie Fleming made that go-ahead score stand up by pitching a second-half shutout.

“Our motto is that you set your own bar,” said Freeman. “You play at a level and then you are only allowed to get better, so Christie (has) created a standard for herself last year that I am hoping she can build on this year.”

Milton was 7-9-2 last season and qualified for the Division 2 South tournament. The Wildcats won a preliminary-round game and then lost to eventual sectional runner-up Scituate in the first round.

“(Our goal) is to make it to the tournament and go as far as we can,” coach Brian Borde said. “Last year we went two games deep and lost. Our goal is to succeed and be a little bit more (of) a factor in the tournament. No one wants to get in and play one game and be out. We want to go further in the tournament.”

Braintree was 7-8-4 last season, losing in the first round of the Div. 1 South playoffs. Freeman mentioned things that the team needs to work on moving forward.

“We have to do a better job winning the ball in the air, just (have) a little bit more organization defensively and we have to score more goals,” he said. “We do a great job getting forward, (but) we’re struggling to get the ball in the goal. We’ve got to get that final push into the goal, instead of just getting it up in that direction.”